Multiple blacklists rate immigration agents

Natalie O'Brien

New evidence has emerged that multiple secret blacklists of immigration lawyers and agents have been created by the Department of Immigration and have been passed on to other government agencies responsible for reviewing decisions on visa applications.

Fresh documents obtained by Fairfax Media have revealed that the "agents of concern lists", which have been used to rate the lawyers and agents, and subsequently lead to tougher scrutiny of their clients' applications, have been revised a number of times with the names on the list expanding from 21 in 2011 to 30 by 2013.

Blacklists shared: Copies of secret blacklists of immigration lawyers and agents have been discovered in files of cases that have been reviewed by the Migration Review Tribunal (MRT). Photo: Patrick Cummins

Those supposedly secret lists, which immigration officers were instructed to destroy once they had been used, have made their way into the public arena as they have also been discovered in the files of visa applicants whose cases have been reviewed by the Migration Review Tribunal (MRT).

Immigration lawyers on the list told Fairfax Media it explained why they had received an inexplicably "hard time" at some MRT hearings they had attended on behalf of clients.

The lawyers said the documents which rated them as high risk would have to have been taken into consideration when they appeared in matters before the tribunal.

Copies of the list have been discovered in files of cases which which have been reviewed by the MRT in 2011 and 2013.

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A spokeswoman for the MRT said that its "members take into account all documents on the Tribunal file and the Department of Immigration and Border Protection file which are relevant to the issues which the tribunal must determine in reviewing a decision to refuse to grant a visa or cancel a visa".

However, a spokeswoman for Immigration Minister Scott Morrison maintained that the list of agents was drawn up on the basis of historical information about issues arising in visa caseloads.

“The list was drawn up some years ago by staff of the partner visa processing centres but was withdrawn from use when it became out of date.”

The department has said the list was created in 2010 and was supposed to be destroyed and not kept on the file of the person applying for a partner visa.

The discovery of the blacklists has prompted a departmental audit and calls for an inquiry by the Commonwealth Ombudsman by numerous lawyers and agents including Marianne Dickie, the director of Migration Law at the Australian National University.

It also prompted a written apology, obtained under freedom of information laws, to one lawyer and the admission from the Department of Immigration's first assistant secretary Garry Fleming that the list was being used "without appropriate oversight and control".

The fresh documents obtained by Fairfax Media which are used by immigration reveal that the importance placed on risk rating the lawyers and agents had intensified in recent years according to the risk tiering questionnaire which is sued by immigration officers.

The question asking if the lawyer or agent is of concern has gone from the fourth question to the number one spot on the questionnaire.

The documents show that applications filed by agents on the A list are automatically deemed to be "high risk". Lawyers and agents on the B list receive a score of 3 which is added to scores received for other questions, the total of which is added up to give a risk rating for the application.

The Department of Immigration has told Fairfax Media in a response to a freedom of information request that it has no documents in existence which show how the lists are created or why.

Fairfax Media revealed last week the department had a secret blacklist which it was using to risk assess applications.

Agents of Concern List A and List B name lawyers and migration agents around the country who have been deemed to be high risk or of concern, leading to a higher level of scrutiny of their applications for clients seeking partner visas.

Some of the lawyers and agents on the covert list have been in business for decades and more than three quarters of them have never had any official sanction against them.

One agent wrote on the subject this week that it is "time for transparency, honesty and accountability. If agents are to be "judged" by DIBP, then let the rules be made public and available to all - agents and consumers."